This may be clutching at straws but I'm trying to find a silver lining so bear with me... Italy went to Ukraine basically thinking that they needed a win (I suppose Ukraine needed the win too) and they got it but they don't need to win in Glasgow, they need to draw. This has to change their attitude, I know that Italy have a lot of quality, especially in defence and that they sgould be comfortable playing a counter attacking game but they are in a slightly awkward position. Do they play defensively and risk being hit with one goal which they might to be able to come back from or do they play reasonably attacking and risk getting hit with the sucker punch, like France were twice? THe bottom line is that we need to win to be sure, if we have a full sterngth team and we're up for it, we can beat anyone at Hampden and we have a chance. If we ply like we did in Georgia, Italy will win.
I hope Scotland makes it to the finals instead of Italy. I want to see a France-Scotland rematch in the semis.
it was a poor surface and taking that into account i thought mcleish would have removed miller and brought on boyd and went more route one and by-passed the midfield. boyd would have won more in the air than miller and mcfadden may have gotten onto some 2nd balls. the midfield seemed to be sitting too far back from the front two even when we were pressing with the ball in their half. i wanted robson on but i don't see what teale would have done. robson, boyd and i suppose beattie were the 3 changes i was looking for. taking off miller, pearson and fletcher. fletcher wasn't fit. he's to be complemented for trying to play his part but it was clear to see the guy wasn't anywhere near match fitness. pearson is never a central midfielder. he doesn't have the ability or the footballing brain to play in that position, especially in international football. he can do a shift on the left flank and did improve slightly when placed there. just as he did against ukraine when the injured mcculloch left the field. our fullbacks were never going to offer enough support going forward. i don't see enough of murty to know if he's an attacking full back but it would appear not on last nights showing. as for alexander, well he was stuck on the wrong side through necessity and it severely diminished any impact he was going to have in an attacking sense. maloney was disappointing and ferguson looked like the thought of receiving a yellow card was weighing heavily on his mind. doesn't matter now anyway. as gordon has mentioned we're a different proposition at home and although it's a monumental task i have a feeling that this group isn't over yet.
yes, but they all were about the same level. his set piece delivery was poor and he didn't really track back a lot to help out defensively. he seemed to be knocked off the ball too easily too many times for my liking as well.
I suppose that one strength French will find in facing Ukraine in Kyiv is that Ukrainian team will need about 5 100% chances to score once. That is what propelled Italy. Any better goal scoring ratio from Ukraine and Italy would have to need a victory in November...
I saw highlights from that game and it looked like Ukraine totally dominated Italy. I would take a similar performance against the French in Nov. I think Italy's defence is stronger and the French keeper is much worse than Buffon. I see a draw being the most likely outcome for our game with the Italians so I'm hoping that Ukraine win.